Colors of the Dead
by Carolina Angel
Summary: Hell broke out into the world the day the first living dead sunk it's rotten, blood stained teeth into the flesh of a living person. Every survivor has their story, this is four sisters and four brothers colorful story...R&R! -Begins with Prequel-


**_X_XColors of the DeadX_X_**

_~X~Action and reaction, ebb and flow, trial and error, change - this is the rhythm of living. Out of our over-confidence, fear; out of our fear, clearer vision, fresh hope. And out of hope, progress.~X~**Bruce Barton**_

**_Prequel_**

_Falling, Dying, Lying, & Loving_**  
**

_"Y-Your so..." she struggled for words as she pressed the bloody, rain drenched, cloth of her shirt harder on the hole in his chest. He smiled weakly as blood dripped in a narrow stream out of the corners of his smirking mouth. "Yeah, I know, dumb. I've been told." he teased through ragged breaths. _

_She shook her head, corral pink orbs trembling shut as she felt her only true rock in a lost world crumbling into death beneath her very hands. _

_This wasn't how this ended...her mom had been turned...her dad had went mad with loss and stubbornness to believe this new world was real and put a bullet through his head...her frail, poor little newborn niece had been infected from birth fresh from her mother's womb...but he had kept her safe. He had been there for her through most of it. _

_She couldn't loss another one. Not another special someone in her life. Not another friend. And defintely not her first ever true love..._

_"D-Don't you do this! Do you hear me. D-Don't die on me Brick Jojo!" she screamed through gasps of heavy sobs. Her nails dug deep into the cloth of her shirt and she willed everything in her to force the blood to stop flowing out of Brick. But crimson red eyes were dimming away into death..._

_"Blossom?" Brick asked calmly on the outside while on the outside his heart was thudding against his rib cage. Scientifically he guessed it was because his body was losing so much blood because of the gun shot wound in his chest; or at least that's what he thought Blossom would say. But he liked to think it was just the fact he knew he was knocking like a angry old man who couldn't sleep because of the racket from yet another party he was throwing. But this time the tables was turned. He was the old man and he was knocking on death's door._

_Blossom grasped the cloth tighter as her body arched down into Brick shallow breathing one. Nearby heated flames made uneasy shivers run up her body, icy droplets of rain from clashing and crackling clouds drenched her in a blanket of Arctic goosebumps, and the burn of of heart breaking with every basing second making her body tremble with the fight to contain unshed tears. _

_"Y-Ye...?" her voice was to shaken for her to speak properly. _

_Brick smirked and frowned a little at the same time. Smirking because of the pride he felt that he could make Blossom, the emotionless, justice obsessed, genius cry over him a rebellious, "bad boy" labeled, with a smart-but-stupid intelligence. Frowning because he was the once breaking down walls that she'd worked so hard to build up after...he pushed the thought away and simply cursed himself for his fate and luck to choose now for his brains to go on the stupid side of his IQ. _

_"If I, y'know, turn..." he let his words hang a little in the air. Moans and groans of the things he just may become mumbling around them, the rain falling lighter now but just as cold as ever, the fire that Blossom's sisters had started roaring back into a fury of life, and the word "turn" drifting like a annoying fly in the mix. _

_Blossom shook her head slowly as she rested her forehead against her shaking, clenched fist. "J-Just shut up...it's not going to happen. It didn't bite you that deep, not that hard-it won't spread." she sobbed to more of a reassurance to herself than Brick. He shook his head, of all the times to go into denial Blossom _would _choose now of all time to do it._

_Sputtering up a bit of blood Brick forced himself up on his elbows and Blossom moved with his body, peeking her pink orbs up to look a him hopefully. "Yeah, yeah whatever you say babe," Brick pulled the cloth out of Blossom's hands and pulled of his red cap. Fixing it on top of her head he smirked; it was a size to big and dropped over her left eye. "But when you stop smokin' whatever weed your on, and I _do _turn," Blossom bit her lip and shrunk deeper into Brick's chest. _

_She expected something sincere. Like in those love novels, where just before the man took his last breath he would tell the girl he was in love with all that he meant to her, how he'd loved her since he first laid eyes on her, how she was the better side of him, and how even death he'd always be with her...that's what Blossom wanted and needed for Brick to say. _

_But this wasn't a romance novel and Brick wasn't mushy-gushy like that..._

_"I promise, I'll eat you last." he wheezed with a sly smirk. Blossom sobbed out a half-hearted laugh. Brick smiled at least he'd dye knowing he'd made Blossom smile through his stupid death. If Butch died and they both somehow ended up standing at the Gates of Heaven; he was going to beat his green brother eight feet deep into hell where he belonged. _

_Blossom wrapped her arms around Brick. Not caring that her chest was bare underneath the think, pink cami, or that Brick's blood was staining her clothes or that a war against the living and dead was going on around them and she should probably be looking for her family. _

_The world had fell right into the depths of hell itself nearly eleven months ago..._

_Blossom had nearly lost a lot and had lost a whole lot more...she'd thought she knew what falling emotionally and mentally was then. _

_But sitting in Brick's lap, her head buried in his chest and listening to his heart beat slowing as her breath quickened still trying to hold back tears that were rolling down her cheeks nonetheless. She realized. _

_Brick was dying._

_Her sisters were fighting, at least Buttercup probably was. Bunny was likely herding children and mothers out of the town. And Bubbles was most definitely doing the same with the Basset Hound dog, the Yorkshire Terrier puppy, the Dwarf Lop bunny, and the little Fennec fox cluttered in her arms. That was if, the worst hadn't happened by now...  
_

_And she didn't know what to do anymore. All of her leader ways seemed to melt into the ground with every drop of rain that dripped off of her body and burned away into the closing in fire. _

_Blossom was done, tired, confused, empty, lost...but she was going to cling desperately to life for her, for Brick. Even though in her heart and soul it all seemed heart breakingly hopeless. But her heart was already beyond the part of breaking, it was shattered, stepped on, and being consumed by dying flames and drowned in a flood of nothingness that she was going to let take her away if Brick died-but she was getting ahead of herself. So, for then, for right then, for now, she was just going to cling to the life and love she had left to savor-and suffer in the hate of bitterness of a reaction to a action... _

_Now she knew for certain what it felt like to really fall..._

* * *

_"Take Diablo, I'll be fine." he assured lighting pushing the short and stout old Basset dog towards the teary sky-blue eyed girl in front of him. She shook her head stubbornly and wished she wasn't holding her sisters pet tan-orange miniature fox in her arms along with her other sisters bunny. _

_"N-No...I-I m-m-mean what about Diablo and M.P.'s kids?" she asked shakily looking for another reason to hold him up, keep him with her, keep him alive. He shook his head a small smile pulling one corner of his mouth. _

_He knew what she was doing. Knew that if he left, this could be the last time he ever saw her again. But, he wasn't going to be the one whose life ended without a least the slightest big of a bang. She could hold his own just like he could; just like they had since the world was hit by a global infection that sent everything on a downward spiral into bloody, rotting, every-man-for-him-self shit hole. _

_"Look, Baby-Blue, I'm going to go find my brothers, kill a few zoms, and then I'll come back for you. I swear." he whispered as he smiled and let his gun go for a moment and hang by it's strap on it's own by his side. He stepped forward and pulled the girl he'd had a unknown (or a least in his mind it was still unknown) into a hug. _

_Bubbles wanted to let the tears flow at that point. She had never known Boomer was this warm, solid, and...unguarded. Usually he was just a senseless, word slurring, dirty-blonde, deep blue eyed, boy. But Bubbles had always sensed a blockage around him to block out any of the usual teasing, mocking, and hurting of the beating he received from his brothers-and probably others too. Now, that blockage seemed to be slipping apart. _

_Feeling the bunny quivering a clawing against her chest and hearing the snarls of the squished fox betwen their flush close bodies Bubbles reluctantly squirmed out of Boomer's arms. Letting the tears flow down freely over her burning cheeks Bubbles looked over her shoulder at the destruction; fire and water fought and collided against each other like the war of the living and dead. _

_Glancing down at her feet she caught Diablo-Boomer, his brother's, and Buttercup's dog-helping to nudge his mini wife Princess, Bubbles's Yorkshire Terrier, onto his back. She wished Boomer and her could be like that right now, insuperable and loving but they were being forced to be separated and fearing the loss of love. _

_Well, they weren't being "forced" per say. If they wanted, they could run away into the fire lit and rain gloomy sunrise from a long night of fighting for their lives. Forget everything, their remaining family, the new editions to their withering family tree, the animals, the friends, the dead, the alive...the world and just run. With the way things were now they'd probably be presumed either eaten alive, dead, or the term of "dead" anyway. _

_They could run, they could forget, they could let their kin believe in whatever they wanted to believe of how they'd disappeared that faithful night the safe haven feel from under neath everyone and hell broke into the almost heavenly barricade. _

_But they wouldn't and couldn't..._

_Bubbles drug her eyes back up to her beloved and felt her break as she analyzed the blood stains splattered over the side on his beautiful tanned face, his deep, dark, ditsy sapphires drowning in fear of not coming back to her but glazed over with the need and drive to prove himself. _

_She shook her head slightly, smiling half-heartedly. What Boomer needed to prove to his brothers, to her sisters, to everyone he meet was beyond her. She'd doubted it once but had let that doubt slip away that night so long ago he took three bullets for her and saved her from being bitten. Now all she saw was a goofy, handsome, brave, strong, idiot who would never need to prove himself in her eyes. _

_Standing on her tip toes she pressed her lips to Boomer's. Bubbles wanted to make it last, make it long, passionate, sloppy, and real but it would hurt to much; it'd feel too much as if this was their last kiss, a inevitable goodbye. And this was _not _goodbye. Pulling away Bubbles smiled. _

_"B-Bunny needs me." she whispered taking a few steps backwards, preparing to turn and run. Boomer nodded as he took few steps back himself. Boomer couldn't seem to move, his feet planted to the ground where he stood. He knew it would hurt less if he just ran instead of letting her do the running so at least then he could deceive himself on things he would never know if he never saw her dashing away from him._

_He watched Bubbles turn on slowly, forcing a reassuring smile to spread over his face. "You better come back to me, Boomer." she whispered to him pleadingly as her whole figure trembled with a new rush of tears. "I will, swear it." he whispered back. He watched her run away with Diablo trotting behind him, Princess on his back as he barked and growled at any undead that proposed the threat of getting near Bubbles. _

_Bubbles wondered why this hurt so much. Boomer would be alright, he was stupid but brave and strong. Fearless, but that just because of his ignorance. He'd make it...he had to. But fear of her confidence in Boomer being proven wrong was the only thing she could think of. _

_Maybe they should have run away like they both thought of. Boomer and Bubbles had seen the thought crossing through their blue orbs at the same time. They could have, maybe would have, and probably should have. But it was too late now, besides life was about trial and error, running away would have been just a horrible error placed on the shoulder, hearts, and minds of their family and they'd never be truly happy with that decision._

_They'd escaped one error...but neither could shake the feeling of there being no room for almost ones. They prayed and hoped for trial, for many trials to come...but in living in the world now, they were only left to believe that they's be lost in a hell hole of unforgivable, permanent error._

* * *

_"Have you completely lost your be damned mind?" _

_She didn't know if it was normal to feel like this. Rage, remorse, and fear were not a normal combination of feelings for her. He couldn't remember his brothers' words past the pang of realization of what he had done. _

_Her bright emerald gems were threatening tears as she banged the side of her fist against his solid, heaving chest. Since when did she give a damn about what he did, about what happened to him, especially about how he felt? The look of horror and anger creased his cloudy forest green orbs as he looked down at her. _

_"Bitten...Gun...Buttercup...?" he recalled as he stumbled over his words. He could barely recall what had happened. A bunch of screaming, tears, shouting, anger, Buttercup slapping him, kids whimpering and crying, a gunshot, blood...nothing. "Butch! Shut up! You sound like Boomer trying to solve a math problem!" she shouted bitterly at him. He couldn't help a smile though. _

_Buttercup dug her nails into his thick material hunting shirt that was covered in blood. Most of it coming from various living dead that had been unfortunate to get in Butch's rampaging, murderous way and some of it coming from the living, that just might not be living anymore. "Your such a dumb ass boy!" she shrieked at him. Butch couldn't even feel the usual anger or even the cockiness coming out at her comment; he just wanted to sink down onto the floor, block out everything but her, and just hold the girl he loved ruthlessly. _

_"I love you..." he whispered as his eyes finally focused completely on her. Inky black, elbow length, choppy, layered strands of hair fell and laced around her face and portions of her upper body, tanned skin was cut, bruised, and bloody, long, dark eyelashes were matted with blinked away tears, fire embers, and faint traces of makeup, blurry vibrant green eyes looked up at him in a fit of anger, love, and helplessness._

_Beautiful..._

_She shook her head. Buttercup didn't want to hear those words. He'd said them so many times until they were just something normal. Those three little words that every girl craved to hear meant no more to her from him than the bruises and battle scars marking her body. "Just shut up! You don't mean it, you never do and you never will!" she screamed, lashing out as her emotion ran wild._

_He scowled at her. "Don't tell me to shut up, I'm fucking serious!" he bellowed back at her. Buttercup took a shaky steps back at the sound of Butch's voice so low and for real. "No...No...NO!" she cried out. _

_All of the times, all of the times to ever be sincere and he chose now. Buttercup didn't want love-so she told herself, didn't want have any sort of feeling for Butch-so she lied to herself, hated to become consumed with the joyful blur of killing-so she deceived herself, and she just wanted things to go back to the way the were-the truth in her mangled mind. _

_"Y-Your not supposed to do this to me! It's just like him-" Butch tried to cut in. "I am _not _him!" but Buttercup barely heard his words through her fury at how the world just seemed to hate her. "Your just like him! This world, this hell, is not the place for love-and I don't want to be in love. What if you die? What if I die? Then what, huh? We go on and pretend we never felt anything?"_

_Tears were leaking like a river from her green jewels. Butch couldn't fight back the anger anymore, why did the only girl he ever felt true, non-hit-and-run feelings for have to deny and defy him? Blame him for what was the past, what was now the present, and for a unknown future? _

_Fear..._

_Buttercup was afraid, overwhelmed with her own insecurities and shattering facade. Butch knew her. He was the same way, that's why he trusted her-loved her. They were one in the same and she always had to try and make them separate. _

_Reaching out for her shuddering, crumbling figure Butch pulled her into his chest. She was shorter than him and he had to crane his neck down to reach her ear. "I'm not the problem here, Butterfly. I'm not him, I may have hurt you-which I won't do again-but I am not him, understand?" he waited for to nod. _

_Lighting stabbed through the sky in the distance and lit up the image of fire-versus-rain, battling around the shuffling of the undead. He wondered if maybe his sister was in the mix of flesh hungry living dead. Maybe, maybe not. Dragging his hands down to the small of Buttercup's back he pressed their bodies closer. The shaky "Y-Yes." reached his ears and he smiled._

_Buttercup let him pull her closer, hating herself for it with every second of his burning grasp engulfing her. She knew she shouldn't blame Butch. It wasn't right and he was just trying to let her in; love her, even though she didn't deserve it. Feeling her hands dwindle to his hip, just below the last pair of abs, she traced the unhealed wound where she had impaled him with a arrow..._

_God, what was this feeling of worry and...remorse swelling up in her and causing a lump that she couldn't swallow to form in her throat. Bringing her hand back up she encircled her quivering arms around Butch's ripped torso and buried her face in his chest. _

_The sound of a gun rang out through her mind as she closed her eyes and let the lump dissolve from her throat into tears pouring from her eyes. _

_Blossom might have ran, might have stayed-she didn't know. Bubbles was most definitely sticking close to Boomer and the pets. Bunny and Burdon? Who the hell knew. They were more off set than the rest of them, even more of a ticking time bomb than Butch and Buttercup combined. She could only hope they were okay; pray that the were all still alive..._

_But was alive the right word anymore? Those things, what had taken her mother, drove her father in insanity, separated her from one of her older brothers, were they considered "alive"? No...just hell to the no! They were shells; flesh hungry, blood thirsty, brain dead, nothings. _

_"I'm scared..." Buttercup whispered into Butch's chest. Fear wasn't in her vocabulary...maybe if the whole world hadn't gone to shit it would have never been added either. Even if it hadn't, there was no way she could go back and change things...but then again maybe she didn't want t o change a damn thing. _

_Heavy groans and gargled moans began to cloud her ears. For the first time she noticed she was crying louder than she thought she had been. The muffled words, "I'm scared...I'm scared dammit!", breaking through her retched cries. Buttercup was attracting the things she should be fighting off right now. But for some reason she couldn't bring herself to pull away from Butch, she felt safe there, hidden, non-judged, and not...murderous..._

_She was scared for her sisters, scared for the two brothers she had no clue were alive or not, scared of the truth that Butch had wordlessly broken down the walls that had only been keeping him away from her heart, scared for the families, the children, everybody..._

_She was scared, for and of anything and everything._

_Except, death-that one single thing almost seemed welcomed. _

_"I-I-I'm scared!" she sobbed out in a shaky scream. Butch held her closer. The rain fell harder. Fire burned hotter. The army of undead enemies advanced closer. _

_Yeah...death wasn't such a bad thing..._

* * *

_Help..._

_It'd been the only thing that she thought was actually always possible in the world for the longest time in her life. But then again that was another life, in another world. _

_Now, though, in this new life and new hellish world she realized what her sisters and her brothers had been telling her since the beginning of a time that was edging towards a unexpected, scary end; sometimes you can't help everyone. _

_But that didn't mean she couldn't try and defy their words-no matter how true they were, right? "C'mon, sweeties, keep running!" she encouraged urgently as she scanned the vast land of a "safe haven" that had been sent straight to the depths of hell itself. Teary eyed, flustered children ran past her. Some of them carrying younger siblings in their trembling weak arms. She wondered if maybe those little siblings were actually just random baby's from the nursery...at least some people-even though they were just kids-had a soul, a heart. _

_Speaking of babies._

_"BURDON?" she screamed out at the top of her lungs as she wheeled around on her heel. Her heart screamed in her chest as it raced against her ribs at a speed it hadn't reached as she watched her little girl-just a innocent baby fresh from her bulging stomach-go from a healthy, squealing, pink with new life baby into a infected, groaning, repulsive green-grey of being a monster...zombie..._

_Burdon had held her through that. He'd helped through everything...why she would never know. Little Asha hadn't even been his, none of her siblings either, she didn't understand why Burdon went against every bit of life morals he had built up over the years for her. _

_Now though Burdon wasn't here to hold her. Wasn't here to whisper soft truths into her ear. Wasn't here for her when she needed him most. She wasn't going to hold it against him though, she never would. _

_As kids rain past her some holding babies, others grasping hands and sprinting, some of the older ones keeping everyone in a small heard wielding metal pipes and baseball bats that they had been able to find since the erratic breakout, Bunny screamed out for Burdon. _

_Bubbles had the kids so her worries weren't on them..._

_Her sisters?_

_Blossom, she'd never been close with her eldest sister but she knew enough about her to think she had ran off from Brick in the forest. Bubbles had taken the first batch of kids to safety and then went back for their pets and another group of mothers' and children. Buttercup was on a murdering rampage with Butch. _

_That's what her mind was telling her but in her heart and soul she knew that her assumptions were wrong. _

_Blossom had stayed, Bubbles maybe had taken a few groups back but during some point the thought it was better to die with Boomer than dye stressed and in tears had crossed her mind and she had ran for the charming dits, and Buttercup had finally, snapped, broke-she knew that from the incoherent wails just barely pushing through the noise of hell breaking loose all over again. _

_Bunny felt her feet running, her legs carrying her forward though her mind was still back at the same spot with a sea of kids rushing around her thinking about the real situations she knew her sisters had put themselves in and what she couldn't help with. _

_She knew where to go. _

_Knew where Burdon was._

_Knew he was planning to be the idiot genius of a hero he was. _

_The dummy hero she had feel in love with him. _

_Burning chemicals, fresh fire, and powder filled her nostrils as she banged her fist on the door of the "abandoned" barn. "Burdon!" she screamed slamming the side of er fist against the old, withered wood of one of the faded red doors. Of course there was no answer just a disgruntled sigh. _

_Her temper flamed a little inside of her. "Buddy!" she screeched out the nickname that she had given him, the only one he claimed to have to anyone else. it had become his second name to the people he let in his circle, but to anyone else...they ended up in heap of flames. _

_At the mention of his nickname Burdon's head snapped up. He'd hope that Bunny was smart enough to stay away from him, or at least be too preoccupied with the mom's and kid's that she would have to help by instinct to care about him. He'd tried to ignore at the shout of his name, but now he couldn't deny her._

_Burdon didn't know what it was about Bunny that made him shut down all his defenses, all the stubbornness, silence, lies, and just everything about him just... haywire-d. _

_Maybe, "Buddy" was able to come out-even if only just a little-around Bunny. The true him that he had buried under Burdon._

_"You liar!" Bunny screamed instantly as she tackled Burdon onto the floor. Her purple eyes flashed around the barn, rigged with lines, cords, and anything else and all leading to the heart of Burdon's mass destruction-a bomb. _

_He scowled up her and looked over to the trigger he had made that he had been just a few fixes away from pushing. "So, if I do this I'll save everyone so what's the big deal?" he said his voice monotone and cleared of the pain he felt growing in his chest. _

_Since when did the emotionless rock Burdon feel pain? Much less any pain for his actions and how they were going to effect someone. But this Bunny not just someone. She had him wrapped her finger and knew just how to break him down from a rock to putty in her hands. _

_"Your such a dummy! I don't want this-" Burdon cut in to her rant. "And killing myself is just like a dream come true for me, huh?" he spat coldly. Bunny shook her head and pursed her lips. "Your sarcastic! Like to set everything on fire! Mean! And...and your a asshole!" Bunny shouted her voice trembling despite her efforts to compose herself. _

_The last part of Bunny's description of him cut deep like a white hot dagger right through his heart. All the hell he had went through for her. All the feelings he' fought off so he wouldn't hurt her or himself for that matter? Just everything and she thought of him as a asshole and nothing more.  
_

_Anger rose in him as she gently but harshly pushed Bunny from her position on top of him. _

_He snatched up the trigger in his hands. Settling his thumb on the top he looked at Bunny. _

_She didn't seemed scared, fazed, or even angered at Burdon. Why couldn't she just be like everyone else and not notice him, just think he was quiet and that would be it. At the same time she was thinking the same thing. _

_Crawling towards him Bunny silently settled into Bunrdon's lap. For a moment she shakily placed her hand around hi forearm before sliding it up to his tensed hand. Finally she pressed her palm against the back of his constricting hand, threaded most of her finger through his trembling ones, and rested her thumb gently on top of his careful not to persuade his finger to push any farther down than it already was. _

_They both knew what they were doing, knew they were risking everything, putting everything on the line, and even worse the idea gave them a weird relief that at least now they wouldn't badgered to grow up too quick. Thier families would try to blame one another and cry over the loss, friends would simply cry and wonder what had the two unknwon love birds to blow themselves up. _

_For years Buddy had prayed, hoped, and wished for help._

_Bunny had been his final source of that help._

_And forever Bunny had always tried to as much as she could, to anyone who seemed to need it, and for all that vast time of what was her useless forever no one appreciated her "help"._

_Buddy had been the only person to want her help...need her. _

_They'd been the distorted edges to a scrambled puzzle. And they'd fit perfectly. _

_"Are you sure...?" Buddy whispered._

_"If it'll help." Bunny whispered back feeling his finger push just a little harder but not enough to cause the explosion that would sent them from the world that was infested with the walking dead. "It will...I was bite..." he answered slowly. His words mixing with the air wrongly. He wanted Bunny to run so he could just die alone like he had lead himself to beileve for all the years leading up to this. But Bunny didn't. "Me too..." was all she whispered as her hand brushed over the bite hidden under the wet mark. _

_"Help.." the breathed together._

_Help..._

_It's what she offered and what he needed. What both of them craved even though right then no one could help them..._

_"Liar..." Bunny whispered squeezing Buddy's other hand into hers. _

_"Love you too..." _

_His finger pressed down a little and hers followed._

_Helps what they needed right then, hell the whole world had needed that since this all started..._

_But being free was the best help they could think of..._

* * *

**_Author's Note_**

_Woooow weeks went into this. I cannot really look it over right now because I have a game in 30 minutes and I'ma be killed if I don;t get ready but promise when I get back I'll read over and re-edit and everything sugs! This is just a test drive to see how people will like this and if I should just y'know continue or let it go...I'll only know if you review! Soo please nervous wreck here (I.E not good before a big game!) so set me at ease with some reviews and hope you liked it sweeties! Until next time...Peace, love, & Good Timez! ^_~_


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